A wild boar painted on a butcher’s shop window in Carcassonne

New evidence of harnessing and milking uncovered in Kazakhstan shows that wild horses may have been domesticated  5500 years ago, 1000 years than previously thought . The horse milk could have been fermented and made in to an alcoholic drink similar to  the Mongolian ‘ayrag’.

This dinosaur met its death as it was trapped in a sticky lime lagoon. It lay motionless, as the salty low-oxygen water was lethal to any scavengers who may have disturbed its position.

The unique mud in which it lay could capture impressions with unusual detail. It recorded the imprints of soft bodied organisms such as jelly fish and even the movement, a trail, of a horseshoe crab. Because of this, after millions of years, we are able to see that the dinosaur had feathers. A bird!

The bird appears to be ‘spread eagled’, ‘ splayed’  and ‘flat like a roadkill.’*

The limestone is ideal for printmaking process, lithography. Being smooth and fine it is able to print great detail and breaks off from the quarry in thin white slabs.

*From: Dry Store Number 1 by Richard Fortey

A blockbuster exhibition about the life and work of Charles Darwin is taking place at the Natural History Museum in London. 

In it, there is evidence that the Evolutionists have adapted. The idea which is usually taken for granted as fact, Evolution, now has to defend itself. Speaking from video displays, scientists fend off the increasing threat of the unscientific Creationism and Intelligent Design.

Creationism in another form was the prevailing idea when Darwin sailed around the globe. The display points out that it was easy to imagine an unchanging world, where everything had once simply appeared, when people lived their lives in the place they were born and rural life stayed the same for hundreds of years. The industrial revolution meant that change was a reality. (Even now, we are shocked by the change in our economy, inspite of  examples of shifts in the past.)

A year or so ago, I had an interview for a design role at the museum. When asked about how I would explain Evolution, I took it for granted that only Darwin’s ideas counted. Following that, I flunked the question, “Could you explain what Intelligent Design is?”.

If you have 10,000 square feet, can accomodate a thirteen foot crate, 4 trucks over forty foot and have circulating security guards, you may be have a chance of staging the exhibit of the Super Croc.  This includes a flesh reconstruction, a super skeleton and the kind of  field tents used in the excavation.

The crocodile lived in the salt water  110 million years ago and grew to 40 feet long.

The Auroch is the European bison which died out in the 1600s. Their shape is recognisable in the  drawings in  the cave in Niaux and others. They were aggressive, often revered and the prehistoric people did not eat them.

A zoologist in Germany tried to recreate the breed using other similar breeds. This was part of a hankering for the past, and as part of the Nazi vision.

Jon Ronson has made a programme about the Auroch

The girth of this giant snake would reach a human’s hips.

Researchers have used the specimen as a thermometre. The size of the snake, and other creatures, indicates the temperature of the Earth at that time, in this case  60 million years ago.

See the article on BBC website